


Attention Shoppers

by radeeoactive



Category: Fallout (Video Games), Fallout 4
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, F/M, Fluff, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, i guess?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-20
Updated: 2015-12-20
Packaged: 2018-05-07 18:59:35
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,524
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5467520
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/radeeoactive/pseuds/radeeoactive
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dee and Hancock rescue a Super Duper Mart from super mutants. And the writer just realized that was a missed opportunity for a pun.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Attention Shoppers

“You good in there?”

“Yep.”

“Straps aren’t too tight?”

“I’m fine.”

“Gun’s not loose, is it?”

“For fuck’s sake, Hancock.” But the corners of her mouth were twisted to suppress a smile – entirely unsuccessful. “It’s got duct tape. Duct tape holds the world together.”

He clamped a hand down on her head, pushing down as if to ensure she was firmly seated. “Look, if you or the gun go flying off, we go to hell in a shopping basket. So I figure it’s better to be annoying than dead.” When had that become his M.O.?

A few extra tugs on the straps assured him, despite her oppositional grumbling. Once he grunted in approval, she leaned back and set her hands onto the minigun’s new side-handles.  _Poor raider’s turret_ , MacCready had called it.

“This is nuts,” she said with a shake of her head. There was a flush in her cheeks and her eyes darted across the landscape in equal measures of excitement and nervousness.

“MacCready knows what he’s doing with a gun,” he assured her. “Usually." 

“Oh, I’m sure the gun is safe between my legs. I’m more worried about the part with the super mutants.” 

He set a hand on her shoulder. The anxious tremor in her arms eased, if only a little. "Not backing out on me, are ya?”

She brushed a knuckle against his fingers just long enough to indicate appreciation, then inhaled, bracing herself. “Be fine once we get moving. How else is Pipes gonna get her Sugar Bombs?” Her grin returned, a sly twist to it. “You just make sure those flares don’t go off all at once again.”

“Oh, here we go…” he sighed with mock exasperation.

“Do things happen prematurely in your pants often?”

“You wanna check?”

“Was it empowering or embarrassing to walk home with no pants on and a scorch mark on your ass?”

“The whole Commonwealth is better for it. You done?”

She held up a finger to shush him. “You gotta point up before firing!”

He sighed.

“Okay, I agree, that was weak.” There was a long pause. Just when he thought she was done, she jostled the cart eagerly. “Oh– oh! One more, one more! When you said it wasn’t your fault, you were a liar, liar, pants on fire!”

“Out of your system?” he asked.

“Yes!” His patience was rewarded with a gleaming, dimpled smile. The scathing retort about her shotgun mishap died on his lips and he only returned the grin.

“Ready?” he asked, now that she’d regained her equilibrium.

She nodded rapidly, doing one last check of the straps holding her glasses in place. He pushed the shopping car to the edge of the hill. Dee leaned back uncomfortably.

“That’s awfully steep.”

It was, but they would be completely fine. He’d done this tens of times before. True, it hadn’t been on grass, but it couldn’t be that different, right? Right.

One foot braced on the cart, he pushed off with the other and held on tightly. It tipped forward and began to roll down the hill. Dee’s nervous giggles turned to outright high-pitched screams. He laughed into her ear, which didn’t seem to soothe her at all. The rush of air threatened to lift his hat from his head. He chanced letting go of the cart with one hand to keep the hat pinned down.

The super mutants below rumbled uncertainly, looking around for the source of the screeching. When they saw the shopping cart pitching towards them, they called the alarm.

“Now!” Hancock shouted.

Still screaming, she squeezed the modified trigger of the minigun.  Bullets rained down on the mutants erratically. Their confused cries turned into ones of pain, then to promises of eating their innards.

The cart hit a rock and bounced high. Hancock was sure it would flip, but with a presence of mind she regularly insisted she didn’t have, Dee stopped her shooting long enough to throw all her muscled weight back as a counterbalance.

The cart evened out and then slammed hard against the Super Duper Mart parking lot. It rattled dangerously but held together and slowed enough to allow Hancock to drop a foot down, regaining some control of the cart’s direction.

Dee seemed to have recovered from her initial terror and was now screaming the same threats the mutants were, half rising against the straps keeping her in the cart, body twisting along with the minigun. He liked this version of her better than the restless, panicked girl covered in mirelurk blood, who lashed out at the smallest affront to her pride. This one was equally destructive – but way more fun. He joined in on the screaming.

Mutants fell before them and their shopping cart of death, massive bodies torn to pieces by the near-endless stream of bullets. Hancock pushed the cart around the perimeter of the lot until they had cleared the ones outside. Rifles fired from the windows and rooftop but they were already far from where the muties were aiming. Tinker Tom knew what he was doing with the wheels when he fixed them up; they were virtually frictionless.

When the outside was clear, he rounded into the entrance, the doors already spread wide open. Closing your doors and locking your windows wasn’t a concept in super mutant land, not when you were the scariest thing on the block. Well, now they weren’t anymore. Now it was Dee.

“Careful not to shoot up the food,” he warned.

“Careful not to crash me into a shelf!” she shot back.

A valid complaint to which he had no response except to squint and make sure he did not actually crash them. 

Their speed hardly slowed as they wound up and down aisles mowing down super mutants like grass. The store was cleared in moments with only minimal damage to the goods. 

But Hancock made another fast round of the store while Dee whooped. She unstrapped herself and stood in the cart, arms up in victory, as they slowed to a stop near the registers.

“ _I am the superior entity!_ ” she shouted, fists punching the air. 

He howled with laughter, doubled over and leaning against the cart for support. It took a while but he finally recovered enough to hold out an arm to help her clamber out of the cart. 

“That was some shooting,” he chuckled. 

She braced herself on his shoulder and swung a leg over. “I’m surprised I’m still in one piece. I honestly thought at some point, you’d crash us.” 

“Well, thanks for the vote of confidence.” 

She was breathless with excitement, green eyes gleaming even in the dim light. Her other leg came over and she dropped all the way down, still braced against him. 

It’d been a while since anything made his heart rate go up like that. You did chems every day or so and you built a tolerance. Combined with his natural ghoulish resistance to most anything, it could take double or triple a normal dose to affect him. But he hadn’t had anything yet today, not even a Mentat. 

Yet his heart was hammering insistently against his chest. He was worried it was audible or would tear through his hardened skin, but when she turned to look up at him, her smile was undisturbed. 

“You ever done anything like that before?” he asked. Anything to keep her this close for a little longer. 

“Ridden a shopping cart down a hill into a supermarket while shooting a duct-taped minigun? No, can’t say I have.” She inhaled deeply. “But it was  _awesome_. And terrifying. But I didn’t piss myself, so not  _too_  terrifying. And – jeez, it smells  _bad_  in here.” 

Hancock wheezed another laugh. “Ain’t even fully nested. Almost no partsacks yet.” 

“Partsacks,” she repeated with a snort, turning away to scan the store. 

Reluctantly, he let her slide out of his grasp. She was always quick to pull away from contact. Always the first to free herself from hugs and handshakes and even pats on the arm – but even so, he couldn’t help but wonder if she was repulsed. 

She looked him in the face when she spoke to him. In the eyes, even. And maybe he was imagining it, but eye contact wasn’t something she managed with others. Life in the Wasteland was emboldening her, but some things would take a long time. And yet– and yet. And yet he couldn’t ask. 

“You still have the flares, right?” She stepped over a skeleton to pick up a box of steak so laden with preservatives, it had endured a nuclear blast and two hundred years. 

“’Course. And I kept my pants this time.” 

“I’m so proud. Remember,” she said, motioning with her hands, “you point it  _up_  and _then_  fire.” 

“Alright, alright.” He shook his head. “Let’s get Piper her boxes of sugar.” 

Dee chuckled and started loading up the cart with whatever her hands could find, still smiling idly as she went. He kept looking over his shoulder at her as he went to fire the all-clear and bring the cavalry and all the other shopping carts to transport their treasure. 

**Author's Note:**

> This was the first real fic I wrote in literally years, and the first thing I wrote for Dee at all, so it's got a less solid grasp of them, but whatever.


End file.
